Buyers become more cautious

An increasing number of people have started to withhold from buying homes in the last few months as a result of inadequate supply, rising property values, tight financial conditions, rising interest rates and most of all - because of the evaluation of their personal incomes. As a consequence, the only investors currently on the market аre the ones with cash (usually acquired through sales of other properties) and those with incomes above the average ones. This, however, has had no impact on vendors who, although gingerly, try to impose higher prices.
Undoubtedly, the most expensive residences are the smaller ones - studios or two-bedroom units in central locations. Notwithstanding their date of completion or the overall condition, properties in Sofia’s city center do not cost less than EUR 2,300-2,500 per sq m. The few cheaper offers that could be found had disadvantages like documentary issues, discredited structure or concerned properties that had just been offered as located in the center but in fact were not.
The upper end prices in Sofia’s city center are now confidently exceeding EUR 3,000 per sq m. A 65-sq m apartment at Gurko St., in a building constructed in the 1940s, a former police dormitory, was on the market for EUR 3,100 per sq m. In the same area, the owners of a 75-sq m fifth-floor apartment on Parensov St., in a building constructed almost 70 years ago without an elevator, claim EUR 3,800 per sq m. The price of a 60-sq m one-bedroom unit at Georgi Benkovski St., close to Tsar Osvoboditel Blvd., has been fixed at EUR 4,400 per sq m.
There are just several sale offers for new apartments with central locations and they command more than EUR 3,000 per sq m. New projects in this part of the capital are not likely to hit the market due to existing structures. However, where new schemes are under way, the maximum levels are likely to be asked because of high compensations claimed by land owners.